I won't drag you down with me

6. Childhood memories

"You did what ?", Sarah shouted.

I widened my eyes and looked around to check if someone had overheard our conversation. "Shhh", I whispered.

The look on her face was priceless. "You're messing with me, aren't you?"

I picked up the green pencil from the table and added stems to my very poorly drawn flowers. I shook my head with a ruminant smile.

Sarah put down the blue pencil she had used to fill in her drawing's background and stared at me. "So let me get this straight", she began. "You broke out of the center at three in the morning with Mr. Mistery and laid on a frozen lake surrounded by frozen sunflowers while you two admired the stars?"

"I know it sounds crazy, but-"

"It is!", she yelled, then cleared her throat with a quick glance around the room. She recomposed herself and looked at me again. 

"But... ", she cut off, a huge smile making its way across her face. Her dimples lightened up her pitch black eyes.

"But?", I said with hesitancy.

"I'm so proud of you!", she yelled and pulled me in a rib-crushing hug.

Uh, what?

When she pulled away, I stared at her, puzzled. My roommate rolled her eyes with a hopeless-looking expression on her face. "This is your first legal crime. The start of a new era. We should be celebrating!"

"Right", I laughed and shook my head, switching my focus back on the drawing. Art therapy was one of the things I looked forward to during my two-month-long stay at Red River. Not many things we got to do were, in my personal opinion, worthy of considerating enjoyable, but drawing turned my mind off for an hour or two and it made me feel at peace.

I usually had no idea what to draw, but I hadn't even had to think about it that day. Memories from the night before were floating all over my mind in an endless flow of bright, vivid colors.

I looked up, searching for a yellow pencil, and saw Aiden enter the room. As soon as he noticed me, sitting in the back of the room next to Sarah, he slightly tilted his head in my direction with a timid smile.

I felt myself blush. When he was out of sight, Sarah elbowed me in the gut. "Ouch! What was that for?", I cried out, rubbing the affected spot.

"What the hell was that?"

I frowned. "What are you talking about?"

"He gave you the look"

"What look?", I asked, my eyes fixated on my drawing.

"The I'm trying to be clueless about what happened last night but I actually enjoyed it kind of look!"

"You're so paranoid". I smiled at her before focusing on my drawing again.

"God, you sound just like my therapist", she snorted, but ended our conversation.

I, too, couldn't stop thinking about it. After we got back, I went to bed, although I never truly fell asleep. My thoughts were racing in my mind, keeping me awake. I couldn't believe I'd let myself be so naive. Breaking out like that, with a stranger, no less? That wasn't me. Even before all that, it had never been me.

I hated that I'd ruined it for myself, like I always did. I never seemed to be able to see the good in things, but only the bad. I couldn't stop myself from imagining the worst scenarios that could have happened.

That was who I was. And that's why what I had done scared me so much. Because I had let my guard down for the first time in forever.

And I thought I wasn't going to let that happen ever again.